Uber ordered to halt transportation services in Germany - <AUTHOR> http://www.dw.de/smartphone-app-uber-ordered-to-halt-transportation-services-in-germany/a-17894286 Google translated article: http://www.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fwirtschaft%2Funternehmen%2Fuber-gericht-stoppt-taxidienst-in-ganz-deutschland-a-989332.html <comment><USER3> I know I won't be popular with this comment and most likely downvoted, because Uber is so beloved (especially in Bay Area circles). But here it comes: Why do people support a single company (like in this case Uber) taking over the business of thousands and thousands of existing companies and hence monopolizing an industry?

In most European cities, taxi companies are small, almost mom-and-pop entities with anywhere between one and say twenty taxis. In fact where I am living now I can call 4-5 different ones all in my vicinity. If there was an app that consolidated the booking process for those - awesome!

But why would there have to be a company that owns the market globally - <USER2> Karachi to Karlsruhe, from Amsterdam to New York, taking 20%, killing competition by it's pure überstrong market presence, brand and financial backing.

The same people that hate Comcast for oligolopolizing it's market (and hence using it's almost-monopoly powers for their benefit) yet somehow wish Uber would succeed and take over the market around the world. Why? Because it's a hip SF 'startup' (if you can still call an entity with $1,500,000,000 in funding a startup)?

<comment><USER4> Taxis are nearly worthless in SF. I've called them many times and they only show up half the time, and that's if they are open and serving your area. There's no penalty for them if they pickup someone else on the way to pick you up. I had to call 4 different numbers on a trip to Redwood city once. Sometimes they don't answer and sometimes they have no one in the area. I've never managed to hail one off the street as I do in NYC.

I'm happy if all the Taxi companies die because they aren't providing good service. Uber and clones let you tap a couple times on an app, know instantly without asking anyone if there are cars in the area because you see them on the map, and then watch the cab come to you on the map. If the driver has trouble finding you they call you. Then at the end payment is all automatic, you just get out.

<comment><USER3> I very much agree - having lived in SF for years myself. But you contradict your own point a bit by admitting that in NYC you easily can hail a cab off the street. So it's really not a global problem (as we are discussing Germany here) at all. It's a problem in some localities, especially in San Francisco.

And Uber solved that problem. For it's local market. The thing is - why would it have to 'disrupt' markets that don't really need disruption or solve problems in markets where those don't really exist? Yet with it's enormous funding and hence market power it can take over markets around the globe, where the dude trying to make a living with his 5-cab taxi company or the student driving his one cab on his own can never even remotely compete.

<comment><USER5> You can only street hail a cab in NYC if you are in certain select portions of manhattan, and it isn't cab rush hour or cab switch over hour. Good luck hailing a cab in the middle of queens at any time of the day.

<comment><USER6> I've hailed cabs in Queens. I live in Greenpoint and there are times that hailing a cab is quicker than waiting for an UberX, especially now that the green cabs are becoming ubiquitous.

Cab switch over hour sucks, but I've also been in a busy parts of Manhattan with plenty of Uber cars showing on the app yet can't get an Uber car to my location.

I've also noticed a drastic decline in the state of UberX vehicles in the past few months (I assumer from their aggressive recruiting effort). Used to be every UberX that picked me up was very clean and typically nicer cars (occasionally getting picked up by Range Rovers or Town Cars). Now quite a few of the cars are messier/dirtier than any cab I've ever been in.

I'll continue to use Uber and UberX when convenient, but I've cut back quite a bit because the drop in quality.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Against my better judgement I'm going to attempt to contribute to this thread. There are good arguments on both sides but most people are talking past one another. As I see it, it comes down to this:

Uber says there is a surplus, people driving cars with empty seats, and they attempt to capture that surplus. From an economic point-of-view that is a good argument. The surplus undeniably exists, and it would be beneficial to reduce it.

The argument on the other side is that this is an issue of public policy. Various countries have decided it is beneficial to legislate people driving strangers in exchange for money. The general arguments are ones of safety, but quality of service also comes into it. Again this is a reasonable argument. There is an information asymmetry when hiring a taxi (I don't know what kind of driver I'm going to get) so legislation reduces that.

The main point seems to be who gets to decide public policy? Uber and "Silicon Valley" types believe that private individuals and companies should be allowed to set public policy. Most others reject this.

The next argument is whether current legislation is appropriate and whether Uber has sufficient features to make existing legislation unnecessary. E.g. are ratings and ubiquitous GPS sufficient to reduce information asymmetry. If Uber wants to engage in this argument it should use the usual methods of setting public policy. I don't know if Uber has started any court cases but I expect they will be involved in some soon if not already, and this is one way to effect public policy.

<comment><USER8> In that case they should claim that UberPool is not a taxi business, since they don't intend to do it full-time (requirement as of PBefG §13(5)1), and as such they want a temporary license (up to 4 years) as per PBefG §2(7) for this new mode of transportation. (IANAL, no legal advice, yada yada)

What doesn't work is to pretend that laws don't exist, and pissing off regulators. That will also make hacks like the above much less likely to work for Uber because that requires some minimum amount of goodwill (given that it is a hack)...

We have laws for everything (as Xylakant succintly stated), but they usually also come with way to thread in new ideas. However, screaming "DISRUPTION!!!1" all the time just isn't good enough here.

<comment><USER9> >What doesn't work is to pretend that laws don't exist, and pissing off regulators

That actually seems to have worked OK to a large extent for the likes of Uber and Airbnb. If they had complied with every existing regulation out there they never would have got off the ground. Whereas going ahead and just launching it is hard for regulators to stop the whole thing if it has wide spread adoption and is popular.

<comment><USER10> Both Uber and Airbnb are currently in the process of being killed of in Germany. If they started here, they definitely wouldn't have gotten of the ground.

<comment><USER9> Yeah, Germany may be a bit unusual in terms of sticking to their regulations.

<comment><USER11> As a foreigner living here in Germany, I have been continually surprised by the level of regulation that is in place here.

I am often doubly surprised when I realise that nearly every single piece of legislation I've come across actually seems to make sense, when someone takes the time to explain it to me.

I personally think that the regulation of public transport is a good thing. The fact that people are insured when they transport me around in a 1 tonne potential deathtrap is a good thing.

The last thing I want to hear when I wake up in hospital gravely injured is "sorry sir, you'll have to sign here to accept liability because the driver of your unlicensed taxi wasn't insured to transport paying passengers".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The court order is here:

[http://docs.dpaq.de/7814-beschluss-landgericht-ffm_uber- taxi...](http://docs.dpaq.de/7814-beschluss-landgericht-ffm_uber-taxi- deutschland_2014-09-01.pdf)

It's (obviously) in German.

The fines are 250K per violation, Uber has already announced they will fight this.

Uber is looking for a communications lead in Germany: [https://www.uber.com/jobs/18835](https://www.uber.com/jobs/18835) , they'll definitely be needing that and more.

Deutsche Welle has it here (in English):

[http://www.dw.de/smartphone-app-uber-ordered-to-halt- transpo...](http://www.dw.de/smartphone-app-uber-ordered-to-halt- transportation-services-in-germany/a-17894286)

edit: thanks!

<comment><USER13> I live in Germany and i am happy that some things are more regulated here.

I like that Taxi companies need to have extra insurance and the cars _and_ drivers are checked on a regular basis. Just like the TÜV (a mandatory checkup every two years for every vehicle) makes sure all vehicles have functioning lights, brakes, proper tires etc.

This ruling only makes sure Uber follows those same rules other transportation businesses follow as well. There is competition in the transportation business here but there is no room for people sidestepping completely sane rules everybody should agree on.

I am in no way affiliated with the taxi business and i like lower fares too. But not at the cost of safety and less checks for cars and drivers.

Once Uber agrees to comply i am happy to use their app and their drivers. I doubt they will be able to operate much cheaper though - i am fine with that.

<comment><USER14> Genuine question: Is Uber really cheaper than taxi? Honestly: in Italy it's not. It's hell expensive, probably a bit more expensive than usual cabs - which are incredibly expensive by definition. So yeah, this "We are a startup", "Silicon Valley" thing is just a horrible excuse to avoid complying with regulations.

If regulations in Silicon Valley (or wherever else) allow Uber business model to be sustainable, good for them. This isn't something obvious when you go international and it is part of the challenge. Simply not giving a fuck is just mediocre and you deserve to cease operations. Period.

<comment><USER15> In Manchester, UK they absolutely are. Especially at night: what would be a £20 ride in a hackney and a £15 fare for a pre-booked company is about £10 with Uber. That's for 5 miles in 20 minutes.

Add onto that the ease-of-use and some level of assurance that if your cabbie takes you round the houses you can get a refund and it's a no brainer round here.

<comment><USER16> Wow, that's a lot. In Bristol UK I can get a taxi from a taxi rank to home, which is just over 5 miles and takes about 20 mins, at 4am, for £10 max. Not tried Uber

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Uber are lying liars who lie in many markets.

This is demonstrated by the fact that in London, they simply went out and got the PHV license, and made sure the vehicles comply (checks every 6 months, public liability insurance, etc.) - if they did this in every other market, no problem.

The issue is that isn't a very sexy business. It's not "disruptive" like car pooling.

And in some markets, the cost of complying with the regulations is extremely high.

Even in London, it's been argued that the app in the car is a meter, and therefore breaches legislation relating to metered trips: only black cab drivers are allowed to meter, and the regulation bar there is much, much higher in part because those drivers are free to just pick people up off the street without pre-booking.

It seems to me that they should either focus on ride-sharing and get out of the private hire business, or they should focus on the private hire business and do it properly.

The regulations around private hire are not some idiot state actors nannying around: in London they have evolved over centuries. Literally. They are constantly reviewed, and London has an incredibly diverse and active PHV market with many innovators (Addison Lee, Hailo, Kabbee, etc.) improving things in regards to customer choice.

</comment><comment><USER18> I use Taxis several times a week (in Germany). A lot of the drivers are already complaining about their income. Most of them are below the minimum wage, which will come in 2015. And a lot expect their company to shut down business. When I ask them about their opinion about Uber, many of the drivers speak positively about such an alternative. It would allow them to work without the need of a concession and to keep more money of the margin. But they also demand the same standards for such an alternative.

I prefer the Taxi (and my employer would not allow Uber in the first place), because of insurance and other minimum standards demanded by regulation (federal, country and town (via concessions)).

So I see a conflict, that is not just about Uber, but about the working conditions and the income in general. If Uber is allowed to work at lower limitations than the Taxi businesses, it will be a distortion of competition. It would make more Taxi companies to go out of business, which already struggle to keep their business and to pay their employes wages above the minimum (today and 2015).

So yes! Uber drivers must maintain the same standards as Taxi businesses, if they offer a commercial service.

<comment><USER19> > If Uber is allowed to work at lower limitations than the Taxi businesses, it > will be a distortion of competition.

Let's stop talking about "competition". The issue here is "the regulations". Are they too broad? Or too narrow? Or ineffective? Or inadequate? Or just fine?

It Uber is allowed to work at lower limitations than the Taxi businesses, then either the Taxi business is too regulated (then some regulations should be dropped) or Uber is taking shortcuts somewhere damaging the costumers or the workers (the reason why the regulations exist in the first place).

I think that, if the current regulations are justified (and this is to be seen place by place), then there is no other outcome other than Uber becoming simply yet another Taxi company, maybe the one with the nicest website.

<comment><USER18> Its both - competition and regulation. If one company does not follow them, but others do, then you have a distortion of competition. The difficulty is in to tell whether Uber is operating like a Taxi company or not. They certainly operate on a different model than the usual Taxi business. So that's why Uber ignored the laws until someone cried foul.

Btw. I think the business is regulated fairly. The income is not. Most difficulties are with the concessions and the natural oligopols around them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> > Uber plans to appeal the decision and said it would continue offering its > services until a final ruling has been made.

I'm curious how they'll do that. They already said that in the Hamburg and Berlin case, but those were administrative decisions where an appeal blocks the injunction until a court decides. This time it's a preliminary injunction from a court, where an appeal has no delaying effect. The injunction can be enforced. The fines are also much much higher - in Hamburg it was a measly 1000 EUR per violation, this time it's 250 kEUR per violation or up to 6 month in prison for the CEO.

</comment><comment><USER21> The irony of this, with regards to their brand name, is delicious.

<comment><USER22> Deutschland: Uber 0, Alles 1

<comment><USER23> Not sure if you intended that, but I'm reasonably sure you did: I found your comment offensive.

Not a reference I like to see and not related to the topic at hand. Certainly not funny.

Yay, downvotes. For the people that "Don't Get It": That funny guy is basically referring to the first line of the 'Deutschlandlied' \- the source of the German national anthem. Thing is, while we kept the third (and just the third) verse as our national anthem, the reference above and the complete first verse, is really just associated with Nazi idiots (it was the only verse used THEN and is still part of their propaganda, plus it's the most silly line ever - even without that heritage it would be something utterly ridiculous to say, write, sing or whatnot). While it's use is not illegal over here, singing (or using) that line makes you a potentially dangerous moron and is generally considered highly offensive.

For this particular German he's basically singing a Nazi song.

<comment><USER24> are you also offended by the phrase "grammar nazis"?

do you believe that all "Hitler cat" memes should be removed from the internet?

maybe we should just ban all references to anything related to nazis. maybe burn all copies of "mein kampf" so no one gets offended?

or maybe we should round up everyone who posts a joke on the Internet and throw them in concentration camp because their beliefs are different than yours.

calm down buddy.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Interesting, took an uber in Berlin about 3 days ago. The options here are much more limited (its UberPop, instead of UberX), and the driver coverage is smaller (my friend recognized the driver as being the same one he had seen a month ago). Cabs are relatively easy to get here and so cheap, haven't felt the need to really fire up Uber much at all for the most part - ie, it was raining last night, and found a cab in 1 min.

</comment><comment><USER26> "Violations of the injunction will result in a fine against Uber of 250,000 euros ($328,108) per ride. Uber plans to appeal the decision and said it would continue offering its services until a final ruling has been made."

Is that an error in judgement on Uber's part? Perhaps they'll settle or get the fine reduced if they remain unsuccessful, but with a fine like that per ride, there is a slim possibility that defying the order could send them out of business, isn't there?

<comment><USER27> Not sure about German laws, but in many places a court order is not put into effect before the appeals have been dealt with. If and when the appeals are declined, I'm sure they have to shut down business with that kind of fines.

<comment><USER20> In this case, since it's a court-granted injunction ("Einstweilige Verfügung") an appeal has no delaying effect. The preliminary injunction gets only granted if the court feels that the risk associated with the action in question is sufficiently high to warrant immediate action. IANAL, but from what I know this injunction can be enforced until it's overturned in an appeal.

That's different from the last two bans (Hamburg and Berlin) where Uber was banned by administrative action (Verwaltungsakt). In that case, an appeal has delaying effect until the case gets heard in court.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Has someone looked at the scope of the German law?

[http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/pbefg/__1.html](http://www.gesetze-im- internet.de/pbefg/__1.html)

>Diesem Gesetz unterliegen nicht Beförderungen 1. mit Personenkraftwagen, wenn diese unentgeltlich sind oder das Gesamtentgelt die Betriebskosten der Fahrt nicht übersteigt;

=> As long as the total fare is below the actual costs the law is not applicable.

It seems if Uber operates at a loss they are fine. ;-)

<comment><USER29> I think the drivers themself would have to operate at a loss. But they also have an exemption for ambulances. Maybe they can offer medical services for their clients. ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I really wonder how much of this is protectionism for Taxis, and how much of it is protectionism against foreign companies. I don't have any particular love for Uber (the way they waste Lyft resources makes them d-bags in my book), but I don't buy the 'safety' excuse being given.

It reminds me of the bullshit safety concerns used to continue Oregon's ban on pumping your own gas at gas stations: [http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/06/its_for_...](http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/06/its_for_the_children_and_other.html)

The reality is, it's a form of protectionism for gas station attendant jobs, just as this German decision smells like regulatory capture. My guess is that if Uber changed policy to actually meet whatever requirements safety they're asking, they'd devise a new set of excuses for the ban, because this is ultimately about preserving the status quo.

<comment><USER8> The "excuse" is the Personenbeförderungsgesetz (law on [commercially] transporting people). Taxis have to implement it (and they do), and so they can complain in court about competitors who don't (as a remedy to state intervention: regulation has to apply to everyone). That's what happened here, nothing more, nothing less.

If the court hadn't stopped Uber, we'd actually see some special treatment (that is, protectionism) in Uber's favor.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Banning Uber (or upholding laws that restrict market-entrants such as Uber) is just another example of banning "Walmart Scotch."

Recommended: [http://theumlaut.com/2014/04/30/how-net-neutrality-hurts- the...](http://theumlaut.com/2014/04/30/how-net-neutrality-hurts-the-poor/)

<comment><USER32> This is a safety thing, not a competition thing.

<comment><USER31> Sorry I'm not getting it. Feel free to correct me at any stage if I'm wrong.

1) You can drive a car in Germany if you meet some basic legislative requirements (Führerschein etc.)

2) You can carry a friend as a passenger - perfectly legal.

3) You could carry a stranger who asked you for a ride - perfectly legal.

4) That stranger could give you gas money - perfectly legal.

5) But if you use your smartphone to find strangers willing to pay you for a ride at this point your activity becomes so unsafe that you need to jump through a whole bucketload of extra hoops? Why is that exactly?

<comment><USER33> 5) The difference is that if you're doing it for profit, there are laws that govern that activities and you must follow them. It is really simple.

<comment><USER34> I think you all missed his point. Yes he knows there are laws. He's questioning why the laws exist. There's clearly a lot of confusion about this because up thread we have people saying it's not about safety, and then we have lots of other people saying it is about safety.

To me having insurance valid for commercial use seems reasonable, but you don't need special licenses or laws to enforce that. Just have a law that says "you must have insurance valid for the kind of driving you do" (which I suspect Germany already has).

The basic point being made here is there is no technical or medical reason why the amount of money being charged suddenly makes driving fundamentally different. You're driving the same car on the same roads with the same driver. So why have governments made it so complicated?

<comment><USER35> There is a difference: Regular insurances do NOT cover commercial activities – so if you want to drive for uber, you need to get a commercial insurance.

This is everything the court asked for: Appropriate insurance and regular checkups (yearly instead of biyearly).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I live in Berlin and this is extremely disappointing. I'm beginning to doubt European cities in general have any clue what makes startups in US work. Here's what pg tweeted when there were protests in London:

 _Lots of cities say they want to be the Silicon Valley of Europe. Uber tests whether they mean it._ ([https://twitter.com/paulg/status/477428094530121728](https://twitter.com/paulg/status/477428094530121728))

Talk all you want about Uber being evil, predatory and not really the One True Sharing Economy - this right here is why Europe won't catch up to US in terms of startups, despite all the nice talk about being friendly to them.

<comment><USER20> I live in Berlin and this is extremely satisfying. I'm beginning to doubt that Silicon Valley startups have any clue how European cities work. We germans in general are weary of evil, predatory enterprises that start a spiral to the bottom.

Jest aside: This is just not how things work here, for good or bad. I think there's also not that much room for disruption in the Uber case, at least in Germany. The market for cabs is very much unlike the market in the US - there's not a single huge company owning all the cabs in Berlin and a medallion does not cost a million EUR. Service has been pretty ok for me so far and I use a lot of cabs, so I actually don't see much of an upside but I do see a lot of potential downsides, not that much for me who could easily afford a surge pricing but for people that maybe can't and have to rely on regular cabs.

<comment><USER37> >>> I think there's also not that much room for disruption in the Uber case, at least in Germany

I suspect there is, otherwise there would be no need to ban it.

<comment><USER38> They haven't banned Uber, just required that they follow the laws and regulations that everybody else has to follow. Once Uber does that then they're free to operate in Germany.

<comment><USER37> "A court in Frankfurt has ordered the smartphone application 'Uber' to stop its transportation services in Germany"

Is this not a ban? Are you saying Uber drivers weren't following the regulations every other driver in Germany has to follow - they were not obeying traffic laws, not holding driving licenses, etc.? No, they didn't follow _additional_ regulations that _not everybody_ has to follow.

<comment><USER39> Ride sharing is completely legal in Germany, the court order makes the difference between ride sharing (which is unregulated) and ride sharing FOR PROFIT, which, in Germany, is a regulated market.

So no, it's not a ban. It's the requirement to make business akin to getting your business registered.

<comment><USER37> Wait, so it's OK for one person to give a ride to another person, on the same vehicle, on the same road, at the same time, but it's not OK to give the same ride if after the ride one person gives money to another person - and the reason is that is the second case the driver and the vehicle (the same driver and the same vehicle!) is _less safe_? How that even makes any sense?

<comment><USER20> This case is not about safety. It's an unfair competition case.

Transporting people for money is heavily regulated in Germany on various grounds, one being safety, others are that Taxis count as public transport in germany and must fulfill certain obligations ranging from mandatory service for anyone at the same rate to transporting disabled people to the doctor (yes, that's done by Taxis as long as those people can still enter a Taxi). Uber is avoiding the regulations in an attempt to save money and be more profitable. This has been judged as an unfair business practice and so Uber faces two options: Stop offering UberPop or comply with the regulations.

The fact that private insurances don't cover commercial rides has a multitude of reasons, one of them is that statistically speaking it's more likely that a commercial driver has an accident since he's more likely to get a significantly higher mileage and more likely to drive at night. But that's a deal between the insurance company and the driver, the law only cares that you own a valid insurance, not about the exact terms.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I liked UberX while I was in the city. Awesome ridesharing. Great.

I don't understand why Uber, in a regulated taxi eco system like London or Berlin, wouldn't just start with UberTAXI? Why not start the process gently by being able to hail a cab and pay through the app. This is the most problematic issue for me as a user. Getting a dedicated cab to show up to my location, just for me.

While living in the Bay Area, I talked to several (yellow) cab drivers that love Uber because it guarantees a fair that their dispatch service can't.

Why does Uber not enter new markets by making booking Taxis easier first, then introduce X at a later point when their brand is better known in a new market?

</comment><comment><USER41> This is not about evaluating what is objectively better for the consumer. There is much less tolerance for the "ask for forgiveness, not permission" mentality in Germany than America, and this ruling proves that. If a competitor like Lyft goes into Germany now, plays by the rules, and shows respect to the existing order, I would not be surprised to see them welcomed and take a huge lead in Europe.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Google Translate: [http://www.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=auto&tl=en&...](http://www.google.com/translate?hl=en&ie=UTF8&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fwirtschaft%2Funternehmen%2Fuber- gericht-stoppt-taxidienst-in-ganz-deutschland-a-989332.html)

</comment><comment><USER42> Just checked Munich, and no black cars are displaying but Uber Pop's are. I wonder how much notice you would get about such an action.

image : [https://twitter.com/paulsavage/status/506714057609867264](https://twitter.com/paulsavage/status/506714057609867264)

</comment><comment><USER43> They're not "banned" entirely, just UberX. The black car service is still allowed.

What I just don't get about that is the fact that the black car service is the thing that's most "analogous" to a taxi service, isn't it?

Maybe I'm not understanding something here.

</comment><comment><USER44> Black cars have all vanished from the map while 'pop' seems to be operating just fine, at least I can see several cars in my area (Munich).

<comment><USER20> Interesting effect, since the ban affects "Pop" and not "Black" which is basically a limo-for-hire service and (mostly) complies with the legal requirements.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Anyone knows why Uber has to pay 250k fines and all the other German taxi apps, such as MyTaxi that have raised $10M, don't?

<comment><USER46> MyTaxi targets commercial drivers that adhere to legislation whereas Uber targets non-professional drivers and does neither check nor care whether they follow regulations (proper license, permits, insurance, etc.)

<comment><USER45> Ah got it, so Germany doesn´t like the "Lyft-part" about Uber, right?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Living in Frankfurt, I still see Uber Pop Drivers in the Uber App. Doesn't know what that means tho.

</comment><comment><USER48> 'Uber of 250,000 euros ($328,108) per ride'. I don't think this is accurate.

<comment><USER20> It is. Alternative: Up to 6 month of jail for the CEO.

</comment></comment><comment><USER49> Deutschland uber Uber!

</comment><comment><USER50> To quote Rand:

"There is no way to legislate competition; there are no standards by which one could define who should compete with whom, how many competitors should exist in any given field, what should be their relative strength or their so-called "relevant markets," what prices they should charge, what methods of competition are "fair" or "unfair." None of these can be answered, because these precisely are the questions that can be answered only by the mechanism of a free market."

<comment><USER51> Careful now. It's daytime in Europe, so the more Laisser faire (US-free- market-style) arguments have a higher change of getting down voted. This will correct a bit in about 6 hours when the East Coast wakes up. I'm not judging it, it's just the way us europeans are 'wired'. The taxi market is one ripe thats ripe for disruption. There's lots of demand and low, all-the-same companies offering a low quality/high cost service. It's also one thats build a lot of rules around it, some for the clients protection and a lot to prevent competition. Large established companies always prefer more rules because it absolutely kills new companies trying to enter a market.

<comment><USER12> The taxi market is absolutely ripe for disruption. But GP did not provide any reasons why Uber should be the way to do it. Taxi companies are regulated for a variety of reasons, not _just_ to keep out the competition and as far as I know nothing stops Uber drivers from getting the same certifications as regular taxis. If they do that _and_ they are still blocked or if they are denied certification then you have a genuine case of unfair competition. Until then Uber is tilting the playing field in their direction by offering a product that competes unfairly with the regulated drivers.

Maybe this is the only way in which such a regulation effort can be challenged but I'm not convinced of that.

As for the 'careful now' and so on bits, anybody quoting Ayn Rand verbatim without adding much to the conversation is probably going to get downvoted, it's not as if she's an authority in the field of economics, and most of her writing displays a shockingly bad understanding of the field.

<comment><USER51> Thank you for the insights. A quick reply: >Taxi companies are regulated for a variety of reasons Correct. But mostly because they made a mess of their nr1 job: transporting people Today we have new and far better ways t regulate a driver's behavior. Payment in advance, navigation to check the route and a easy way to judge the driver afterwards. That takes care of most of the complaints.

<comment><USER20> >Taxi companies are regulated for a variety of reasons Correct. But mostly because they made a mess of their nr1 job: transporting people

This is not how I feel about it in Germany. Whenever I needed a cab, I got one, for a fair, reasonable price. Might be a little longer if I'm out in the fields or when a thunderstorm hit Berlin and there's no public transport, but sooner or later, I was picked up. Taxis are treated as part of the public transport system here, they have obligations (must transport everyone for the same price, must provide basic service at any time, regulated rates, ...) and in return receive benefits - effectively a monopoly on the taxi market.

Now, if we decide to repeal the benefits and allow UberPop, how are we going to make sure we fulfill the obligations? No, surge pricing is not a solution. There's probably a solution, but I'm very much not convinced that Uber is the solution, so until someone presents a genuinely better system, I'll stick with what we have. It's not perfect, but good enough.

<comment><USER52> Is there a law forcing Taxi drivers to go to work during a hurricane or New Year's Eve or something? If not, how is the current system of not being able to find a ride better than Uber's system of making you pay a fair market price for it?

<comment><USER20> Yes, at least in Germany, there is. Taxi companies are obliged to provide a minimum level of service or loose the license. The administration can even order a license holder to expand his business if there's public need. ([http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/pbefg/__21.html](http://www.gesetze-im- internet.de/pbefg/__21.html))

<comment><USER52> I can't read German, do you mind telling me the details of the minimum level of service? If it's per week or per month it doesn't solve the problem when there's inclement weather or a holiday or a conference, etc.

<comment><USER20> The law itself does not specify the level, it grant the authority do decide to the relevant authorities. (For example the administration in Berlin), so things will vary depending on where you are.

Generally speaking I haven't had any problem finding a cab in Berlin. The longest wait was after a thunderstorm took out most of the public transport a couple of years ago and that took like 20 minutes somewhere in the outskirts. I usually either flag one down on the road or use the smartphone app.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Elves Leave Middle Earth – Sodas Are No Longer Free (2009) - <AUTHOR> https://steveblank.com/2009/12/21/the-elves-leave-middle-earth-%e2%80%93-soda%e2%80%99s-are-no-longer-free/ <comment> anthony-james As an accountant, I feel like employees are severely underpaid in highly- skilled markets (like tech, not accounting), and I think that companies don't actually capture the true cost of a single full time employee.

Most see a salary, benefits, fringe costs (like hiring HR and finance teams), lunches, etc. Some of the better firms add in the cost of hiring employees with intangibles, like communication, poise, and professionalism, but the truly great see the largest potential cost - that they do better work at a competitor.

If you're paying an engineer $100k to add 150k worth of value to your product, the true value of their work is $300k: $150k worth of value to you, and $150k worth of value that isn't added to your next closest competitor.

It's the same reason football teams say "defense wins championships" \- because Defense is the only position where you can simultaneously score points and stop your opponent from scoring. Offenses can only score.

Now, that employee shouldn't be paid $300k because that's the true value for the organization, rather, they should be paid as close to the marginal benefit they directly apply to the organization - in this case, $150k. Doing so may be a breakeven point from a cash perspective, but a billion dollar company that breaks even is worth more than a lemonade stand making $10 profit.

From an accounting perspective, this can be observed as employee expenses (temporary equity accounts) providing value to products (permanent asset). When the employee is terminated, the assets still remain, so for anyone with any equity stake in the firm, it is beneficial to pay as much as possible up to the point that the company a) doesn't run out of runway, b) retains talent to further grow the assets and c) doesn't grow competitor assets.

The CFO that cut soda costs by $10k also boosted the equity of all the competitors that hired the disgruntled employees - and most likely by a value greater than $10k, and multiplied by each employee that left.

Just my $.02

Edit: Cut soda costs by $10k total, not per employee

<comment><USER2> I don't think it was 10K per employee (that'd be a ridiculous amount of soda). It was 10K total.

<comment><USER3> I thought it would be fun to do the math on this one. A 12-pack of coca cola cans is $5.00 USD. So 10K would buy 24K cans of coca cola. If that was their yearly soda budget, it would be 66 cans per day. So yeah, obviously an absurd amount for a single person to be consuming.

<comment><USER4> Not to mention that in buying the soda in bulk, they'd almost definitely get a better price per can than a single six-pack

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> Small perks like free lunches, gym membership or a massage every month are huge in making employees happy.

We're a seed funded company and provide free lunches to our employees. We also reimburse up to 100$ a month for fitness/gym memberships. Some of my friends working in large organizations don't get these perks, and point out that they're wasteful of a company that is cash flow negative and trying to conserve capital.

What most people with such mindset don't realize is how valuable inspired people can be. For employees to be inspired, they must do work they find meaningful and they must be appreciated and challenged. But they also must realize the company genuinely cares about them. Then they _want_ to give back to the company; they want to exceed expectations because they love how the company cares about them.

Now you need to show care to employees on an everyday basis, but one amazing way to show it is with perks like these. 100$ a month for gym or 200$ a month for lunch per employee is not outrageous if you compare that with how much you pay them every month. It's almost miniscule. Also, in most startups at least, they're getting paid below market rate in exchange for equity etc. Not having to worry about lunch or gym everyday makes a huge difference psychologically.

The one situation where you can justify cutting perks is when the company is going through a genuine crisis, cutting the perk is critical to get through, and you let everyone know this is temporary and it's just something we all must do to get through this crisis. Otherwise, instead of trying to cut soda out, the management needs to focus on growing revenue and profits and ask themselves why they're not succeeding there as much as they'd like to. Hiding behind a soda cut isn't going to fix the issue.

PS: I used to worked at Salesforce where we got several days a year off just to go volunteer time at non-profits. You'd be amazed at how much employees love the company for allowing them to do things non-work related that they're passionate about just a few days a year while getting paid for it. It says that the company has a warm heart. The impact shows up in the company's relentless growth year after year. Same with companies like Costco. Showing care for employees has an outsized impact on the bottomline.

<comment><USER5> > the company genuinely cares about them

They don't though, in most cases. All that stuff is just window dressing. I haven't thought about it a lot, but genuinely caring might mean not firing someone going through a rough patch, when their productivity is pretty bad.

<comment><USER2> I'd say that when you've worked at a company > 6 months, you know if your manager cares about you. You know if the management cares about you. Doesn't take much to figure that out.

I think there are 1-1 and public ways of showing care. When an employee has a performance issue and is going through something rough, you have a private conversation, nobody else needs to know (unless they're impacted/frustrated and you let them know some of it to make them cut some slack) and the employee is taken care of.

Perks are a public way of taking a stand and saying I care about people and will provide these perks and won't take them away except in the direst of situations. Providing perks won't make people love you, but it shows you care. They're nice to get and show thoughtfulness. Especially if you're not obnoxious otherwise.

<comment><USER5> Thinking out loud: maybe "giving without expecting anything in return" ? Perks and compensation are things you mostly expect to get something back from.

Something genuinely nice/caring at the place I work now was the Wednesday before Thanksgiving where they just told everyone to go home after lunch and enjoy the long weekend.

<comment><USER2> That's a great example.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > The most talented and senior engineers looked up from their desks and > noticed the company was no longer the one they loved.

This is well-worded. The problem for these execs wasn't that the company was no longer a good place for engineers. The problem was that the engineers _noticed_.

Don't be the engineer who doesn't notice their job sucks until they start charging for soda. By that point you've been working for a terrible company for a long time.

</comment><comment><USER7> The free soda n junk in startups is bullshit. I'd rather get paid a little more and spend that on what I choose (something healthy). Who would be enticed by that? What is enticing to me is the freedom to work how/where/when I want.

<comment><USER8> Agreed. TANSTAAFL, and I guess it is the old left (as in everyone equal) vs right (free choice) debate.

We get free bread for lunch. Cool, but I don't wanna eat bread.

Coffee is free. Cool, but it is bad quality, my el cheapo espresso machine at home is even better. Plus I'll experience a massive down in the evening. Oh hey, not the employer's problem.

I've never seen free soda anywhere, but the thing is: it is just a lot of sugar, with too little water. I won't drink that if I get paid for it.

At least water is free, and that's important in the summer. I'm free to go grab a cup, and the walk is healthy, too.

Then there's these parties 'for team spirit', with all kind of fried food. Cool. Guess who pays for that?

Screw all this. Like you said; "I'd rather get paid a little bit more."

<comment><USER9> I agree with you - but there are two advantages to giving perks like food:

No transaction costs. Not just the actual monetary cost of the transaction, but no need to employ people to man registers, no need to wait in line to pay. And more subtly, no need to argue with yourself about whether it's worth it to buy the item you are consuming.

Secondly, these perks are bought in bulk and provided without having to pay income tax on them. So it's just cheaper than paying people more and having them buy the goods.

That being said, I do wish there were more healthy options by default.

<comment><USER7> An additional point as to why I dont like this.. I'm busting my ass in the code mines making this amazing software thats making us all money. Then 'management' waste it on frivolities, like free junk food, booze, time wasting exercises, stuff that _they_ like. It also means they may be unthinkingly following the silicon valley style 'startup' stereotype, which is actually almost depressingly ironic. Anyway, its not a big deal, but that stuff is a warning sign for me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> " _It never ceases to amaze me how many startups make the mistake of killing off the free drinks._ "

(One of the comments on the page.)

But wait a minute. Killing off the free drinks is just the signpost. The change is primarily in the size and the culture of the company itself. Charging for sodas might be the first, but it isn't the biggest change that the company is going to, and going to have to, make as it grows.

Does anyone really believe that IBM, Amazon, Facebook, or Google would still be their happy fun startup selves if they still gave away free sodas?

<comment><USER11> I would be shocked if Amazon, Facebook, and Google _don 't_ still give away free sodas.

<comment><USER12> Amazon doesn't.

Facebook and Google both give away free food, so I can't see why soda would be a problem.

Microsoft has free soda and the food is fairly cheap.

<comment><USER13> _Microsoft has free soda and the food is fairly cheap._

Eh? Could have changed since I was last there eleven years ago, but in the last four or five years of my tenure I rarely ate in the cafeterias because for less money I could get more and better food within a five minute walk. _And_ I got to go for a walk at lunch. (So I guess I'm talking on the order of fifteen years ago. Never mind the old man in the corner mumbling to himself about how it was better, er I mean worse, back then.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> > Some had already been irritated when "professional" managers had been hired > over their teams with reportedly more stock than the early engineers had

That right there is a huge warning sign that they're not valued well and that they never were.

<comment><USER15> Wait. I know all about having dunderheads hired above me, having gone through the dot com bubble and crash.

But are you implying that no VP should ever be hired over the early engineers? I can imagine numerous situations where doing just that would provide value to the engineers and the company. And an experienced VP, even if expensive, can be a bargain if they've "done this before".

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> I still don't understand why companies would willingly serve free drinks (and snacks) that they know will only deteriorate the health of their employees. Free drinks, sure, but 290-calorie cans of sugar, and bags of fat? Say what you will about adults having free will to make bad choices, but your company doesn't give away free cigarettes.

<comment><USER17> Right next to those are generally the free diet sodas, the free seltzers, and the free teas and juices.

Next to the chips and candy are the protein bars, trail mix, nuts, and fresh fruit.

Over in the cafeteria, next to the free pizza is the free salad bar.

With any luck you've got a range of employees. Some are concerned about their weight; some are concerned about getting enough vitamins; some really really want a boost of sugar and caffeine. It's possible to cater to all of them.

<comment><USER16> Some really need a cigarette. Would you provide cigarettes in vending machinea?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> What? They quit the company because they no longer got free sodas? I'd rather have an extra 300$ of salary per year, than free cans of Sugar all year. And, if the best developers have so much bargaining power as to leave, just because of sodas, why aren't they leaving toxic work places like Amazon in droves?

Other places are cutting cost in far more profound ways: laptops and computer equipment, etc.

<comment><USER19> I think that's probably over-estimating the case value by a fair amount, because the company should be buying in bulk. They also would take the expense off their taxes, whereas if you buy soda, both of you pay taxes.

<comment><USER18> This is a good point. But, there's also some inefficiencies that creep in because like a centrally planned ecomonomy, the company can not adequately predict the demand for each free snack, food and drink, leading to excess waste (at least for perishable items).

personally, I would rather have teas and vitamin waters, rather than cans of sugar.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> (2009)

That's not to say that it's no longer relevant. It is relevant, perhaps even more so now. But it was written in 2009.

Have things changed?

<comment><USER21> Nothing really. This story comes up all the time.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11635066](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11635066)

HN doesn't have "sticky" posts, but sometimes you wonder if it should.

<comment><USER20> It's been submitted a lot:

[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Elves%20Leave&sort=byDate&date...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Elves%20Leave&sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=story&storyText=false&prefix=false&page=0)

Massive discussions:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5751329](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5751329)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1007750](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1007750)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> > It's about the company's most valuable asset – its employees.

There are often two ways to look at that statement.

Employees aren't fungible and how that cuts both ways.

The longer someone works in an established company the more tribal knowledge they accumulate to the extent that an equally talented fresh face cannot replace.

And the other is that some employees have already done their part & are now not easily moved into a different role (Peter principle or otherwise).

That fine line is somewhat scary to look at, particularly when you work in a boom-bust environment like a video game company or when the company does a tough pivot.

</comment><comment><USER23> My company is just about to make a mistake like this. It's sad to know it's coming and watch it happen in slow motion.

</comment><comment><USER24> The thing that irks me about ALL of the places I ever worked at is that they prefer to shower you with benefits like [small partial] free dental, gym memberships, food stamps, and what not.

It seems nobody ever stops to think "Hey, our employees are ADULTS, right? How about we just give them all these money as a flat paycheck increase and let them decide what to do with them?".

I switched desires many times in my life. Sometimes I've been going regularly to dentists, other periods I've been going to the gym, and then I have been eating twice a day for months -- and half a year later I wake up to the fact that it's much healthier to eat 5-6 times a day (but food stamps don't cover for more than 1 meal), and then a year later I figure I simply want to watch most of the modern sci-fi TV shows in several huge binge sessions. Examples abound from mine and many others' experience.

These organizational policies are pandering to the common lowest denominator. _THIS IS ABSOLUTELY FINE_. The part that pissed me off in many of my office jobs in the past is that the managers fail to recognize the people who don't want their free things and would prefer another format of loyalty bonuses.

The biggest failure of the management in organizations like those in the OP is the fact that these people are under the illusion that they can shoehorn their people into strict processes during one big effort session, and then never do management ever again.

This never works.

</comment><comment><USER25> This old, famous article from Steve Blank... not sure what to make of this?

Did Google started to charge for it's meals or something?

</comment><comment><USER26> Is this in response to the bloomberg article on how the new CFO over the past year has been cutting moonshots?</comment>


A first look at Tesla's 'astonishing' new ride - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/autos/story/20160210-first-drive-tesla-model-s-p90d <comment><USER2> £113,180 > US$164,000

It had _better_ be astonishing.</comment>


New revamped version of the AnyMeal recipe management software - <AUTHOR> https://www.wedesoft.de/software/2020/06/30/anymeal/ <comment><USER2> Many recipe sites now have metadata at the top of the page in json-ld or in embedded in the html based on schema.org structured data.

[https://developers.google.com/search/docs/guides/intro- struc...](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/guides/intro-structured- data)

There are apps which can import from these sites. for example "recipe keeper", you can browse third party sites with schema.org recipes from inside the app and it will import them into the app management software.

Structured data typically maps to RDF, which is for graph databases like apache Jena or RDFox, but since most recipe data does not have backlinks or cyclical links, any type of JSON or YAML store should be sufficient.

If you are still updating your app, it would be cool if you could add support for recipes sites with json-ld!

<comment><AUTHOR> It is difficult to support more recipe formats because they are more generic than MealMaster. But I can take a look.

<comment><USER2> Nice ! Here is an example

Recipe: [https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/tofu_peanut_stir- fry_6272...](https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/tofu_peanut_stir-fry_62729)

Google review tool: [https://search.google.com/structured-data/testing- tool#url=h...](https://search.google.com/structured-data/testing- tool#url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.co.uk%2Ffood%2Frecipes%2Ftofu_peanut_stir- fry_62729)

From command line:

curl [https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/tofu_peanut_stir- fry_6272...](https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/tofu_peanut_stir-fry_62729) | grep -o -P '(?<="application/ld\\+json">).*(</script)'

<comment><AUTHOR> Looks like the recipe ingredients are not structured any further. That means that it is going to be difficult to extract amount and unit from the text.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Crazy early (1985!) example of a recipe markup system, RxOL: [https://web.archive.org/web/20021105191447/http://anthus.com...](https://web.archive.org/web/20021105191447/http://anthus.com/Recipes/CompCook.html)

<comment><AUTHOR> That's an interesting article. Thanks for sharing. Maybe something more structured than MealMaster is required when programming a kitchen robot in the future ;)

<comment><USER3> Yes, that was our conclusion after reviewing numerous pre-existing systems, and we have now built one (the robot, and the more structured recipe markup system). RxOL was just one system we reviewed, which I appreciated for the article's explicit discussion of the rationale for its architecture.

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow. Really? Do you have any videos of the robot to share?

<comment><USER3> Absolutely not, for IP protection reasons. 4 years of R&D. Our strategy for commercialization is wholly owned network operation. Quite unlike the apparent de-facto strategy within the segment of "wow-factor novelty" we have designed for operation as an always-available urban utility.

Examples of "wow-factor novelty robots": Foodom in Guangzhou, Ekim/Pazzi in France, Creator in SF, Spyce in Boston, etc.

It seems the done thing, when that fails to commercialize, is that you spend marketing budget on expensive chefs to convince people the food is good, then you go back to your investors for more money, then you become a zombie startup...

(Edit: Oh there are _many_ more projects... it is quite an active area globally, despite a lack of significant successes. Most making the same mistakes. See [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmXLqImT1wE&feature=youtu.be](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmXLqImT1wE&feature=youtu.be) and [https://patents.google.com/?q=food&assignee=Amf+Incorporated...](https://patents.google.com/?q=food&assignee=Amf+Incorporated&before=priority:19900101&num=100&oq=assignee:\(Amf+Incorporated\)+before:priority:19900101+food) for an early example.)

<comment><AUTHOR> PS: I have played with robots a bit myself: [https://github.com/wedesoft/arduino- sainsmart](https://github.com/wedesoft/arduino-sainsmart)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I used to look up recipes online and never bothered collecting them, but now with all the ad laden and SEO optimized recipes sites, I think it's time for me to go back to collecting the ones worth keeping. Thanks for bringing this up and for the tool. I'll give it a try.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your comment. Of course one can use a search engine for finding recipes. But using a recipe database one can perform ingredient searches and category searches more easily.

<comment><USER2> There's some interesting ideas in this space too

With supercook app you can go through your fridge and say the ingredients that you have and the app will tell you what recipes you can cook [https://www.supercook.com/#/recipes](https://www.supercook.com/#/recipes)

There's another app that works in reverse, you pick what recipes you want then it gives you a shopping list. I think the app was Mealime

<comment><AUTHOR> Back then I tried to implement that, but if I tell it, that I have no water, it ruled out many recipes. If I told it, I had water, it suggested coffee or tea.

<comment><USER2> Structured data can be imported to graph databases like Apache Jena or RDFox, and then recursive queries can be done with alternatives.

Here is an example using RDFox: [https://imgur.com/ziZdIzA](https://imgur.com/ziZdIzA)

My fridge has "noodles, tomatos and butter", But I know only one recipe which calls for "noodles, sauce, oil, optionally cheese". However you put alternatives in the database, if you have tomatos, you can make sauce, if you have butter, you don't need oil.

RDFox correctly says I can still make :spaghetti.

Query:

select DISTINCT ?recipe where { :fridge :item ?x. ?recipe a :recipe. ?recipe :requires ?y. OPTIONAL { ?y :alternative ?z }. FILTER(?x IN (?y, ?z)) }

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Cool project! One of my earlier projects for learning Scheme was a similar system whose selling point was automatic "smart" ingredient substitution. It's interesting that one of the key selling points of this is it's focus on quickness of search. I can't imagine having so many recipes that a computer would have a hard time searching through them, but then perhaps I'm just not the target audience :)

Aside: I know everyone loves to hate electron/web tech, but being an electronician myself, I can't help but wonder how a web-tech version of this would look. For one, it would be nice to be able to try this out, but the current version is unavailable on my platform (MacOS). An Electron or web version wouldn't have this problem, and a web version would work with an iPad or similar, which is a nicer kitchen tool than any keyboarded-device in my experience. Potential hanging points would be in parsing the recipes, and search. I'd imagine that for search it wouldn't be all that difficult to build up a sufficient index programmatically without mySQL, but I could be wrong. As for parsing, the examples I've seen seem all quite simple, but of course the difficulty in parsing is always the long tail.

<comment><AUTHOR> Not sure about Electron. You would probably still need the parser to be Flex/C for performance. Even using Flex and C it takes about half an hour to import 250000 recipes. Sorry that I haven't done a build for MacOS. But I don't have a system for testing.

<comment><USER5> Any chance that recipe dump is available online anywhere?

<comment><AUTHOR> The thing is, I don't have the copyrights. I just downloaded the recipes from Glen's MealMaster archive and imported it. But MealMaster is human readable text if you just want to look at the data.

<comment><USER5> Thanks, found the archive but looks like the "140,000 more recipes" link is dead.

How did you deal with the ambiguity in representation of ingredients? For instance, looking through some examples it seems like an ingredient description can continue onto two lines, and that is indistinguishable from an ingredient followed by an ingredient with no measurement.

Ed: also, do you intelligently deal with the "or" clauses in some ingredient lists? It seems their syntax is ill defined as well.

<comment><AUTHOR> An ingredient continuation line has to start with a "-". Otherwise the software can't recognise it. There is no intelligence in the parser.

<comment><USER5> Interesting, a quick manual parse suggests that would work for a majority of cases, but there is definitely a sizable minority of recipes playing fast and loose with formatting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Thanks for all your effort! I haven't tinkered with mealmaster files in ages but you've given me a reason to dig through my old CDs to find my archives. Unlike zip files of old code or software, recipes are likely just as useful today as they were 10 or 20 years ago.

One thing I noticed when working with Sqlite3 recently is that they've implemented full text searching.

[https://www.sqlite.org/fts3.html](https://www.sqlite.org/fts3.html)

I found the implementation simple to employ and incredibly fast and powerful. Perhaps it could be a helpful tool in a generic search? Just an idea!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your suggestion. At the moment I am looking into bulk operations for categories. But I might give it a go later. Not sure how fast it will be. It would need to run on 400 MByte of text!

<comment><USER6> I ran it on a 67GB sqlite database with approximately 15 million rows in one table and 300 million in another and on an SSD it spit out a result in less than a second. On a mech drive its 5-10 seconds, but that's a factor of 10 faster than if I did a traditional WHERE clause with LIKE/GLOB.

The drawback is that it increases the size of the database, almost exponentially depending on the number of columns you include in the FTS. But its fun to tinker with!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Another thing I forgot to mention in the article is that I set up a Debian Sid Docker container in order to build a package to submit to the Debian developers. Hopefully I will find a sponsor soon so that it will eventually be available as a package on Debian and Ubuntu ...</comment>


Load OSX 10.5 Leopard on the eeePC - <AUTHOR> http://uneasysilence.com/archive/2007/11/12654/

<comment><USER2> osx86 isn't exactly new.. neither is this article, dating from Nov '07.

Besides, running Tiger or Leopard on a machine with 512mb ram and a 900mhz proc is going to be very painful. Not to mention the 8gb hdd max.. An OS X install (with Xcode so it's useful) will fill that up on its own without any additional files.

(Unless the Eee 1000 Series is out anywhere but Taiwan yet? In which case, the Eee _might_ run OS X decently, but I still don't imagine it being worthwhile to spend time on.)</comment>


Boltons: over 100 Python utilities - <AUTHOR> http://github.com/mahmoud/boltons <comment><USER3> Very nice collection. I like the cacheutils LRI and LRU setups [1]. Interested in the StringBuffer [2]. The Table object looks useful [3]. Overall some great additions in utils that you can tell were added through usage and shipping needs especially in strutils, listutils, formatutils etc. Lots of common ones in our own python or other platform libs.

In any review there is always a few WTFs like this one [4]. I am surprised you didn't get _arrested during that development_

[1] [https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/cache...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/cacheutils.py#L5)

[2] [https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/strut...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/strutils.py#L282)

[3] [https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/table...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/tableutils.py#L180)

[4] [https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/easte...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/easterutils.py)

<comment><AUTHOR> Hahaha, so glad someone spotted that. :)

<comment><USER4> What to do about boltons - and you will get boltons.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This doesn't seem portable: [https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/tests...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/tests/table_html_app.py#L8)

<comment><USER6> A more permanent link: [https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/e5b75821781b37ee8ccf...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/e5b75821781b37ee8ccf3d30f20e1fd48209520e/boltons/tests/table_html_app.py#L8)

See [https://help.github.com/articles/getting-permanent-links- to-...](https://help.github.com/articles/getting-permanent-links-to-files/)

<comment><USER5> I know about getting permalinks to Github. Also:

* You can shorten the commit id:

[https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/e5b7582/boltons/test...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/e5b7582/boltons/tests/table_html_app.py#L8)

* You can highlight ranges:

[https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/e5b75821781b37ee8ccf...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/e5b75821781b37ee8ccf3d30f20e1fd48209520e/boltons/tests/table_html_app.py#L8-L14)

* You can ignore whitespace in diffs:

[https://github.com/blog/967-github- secrets](https://github.com/blog/967-github-secrets)

</comment></comment></comment><comment> cool-RR Quite similar to my project, Python Toolbox:

[https://github.com/cool-RR/python_toolbox](https://github.com/cool- RR/python_toolbox)

It supports Python 3.

<comment><USER7> I'd love to explore this further, as it looks like you've put a ton into it, but the simple difference in external documentation being there for bolton makes it much more attractive to me.

Does look like you docstring your functions--can't you autogenerate a docs site?

Edit: I do see the docs site, but it's a pretty sharp subset of the modules. The topical guides are nice, but I really prefer web-accessible basic docs too, so skipping those in favor of topical only isn't awesome from my POV.

<comment> cool-RR I agree, more documentation would be very helpful. Unfortunately, no time...

<comment><USER7> FWIW, even the most basic module:function:purpose docs would help.

The primary challenge in a toolbox is knowing what tools are there. Having to either browse the code or pydoc it myself to know the scope is a bit of a hump.

First thing I did with bolton was read the docs start to finish. That way when I hit a problem, I'll hopefully remember bolton could solve it.

I will check yours out when I have time to go through it--it looks very multifunctional.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Really like the concept, and would love to use this in some of my projects, but no Python 3 support.... :'(

<comment><AUTHOR> Python 3 support is pretty trivial for all the ones that come to mind. I'll look into it tonight.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'd been wondering how to do this... [https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/easte...](https://github.com/mahmoud/boltons/blob/master/boltons/easterutils.py)

</comment><comment><USER7> Very nice. These solve a number of small but real problems and it looks like a great utility package!

I think the docs of iterutils.split() vs. iterutils.split_iter() might be a little off.

They both claim to return lists but split_iter() says if you want lists, see split(). Without having installed the package yet, my guess is split_iter() returns an iterator. Either way, the docs are contradictory.

[https://boltons.readthedocs.org/en/latest/iterutils.html#ite...](https://boltons.readthedocs.org/en/latest/iterutils.html#iteration)

Thanks for this!

<comment><AUTHOR> One returns a list of lists, the other an iterator of lists.

split_iter() docs say, "split_iter() yields lists of non-separator values," whereas split() docs say, "Returns a list of lists." Still, I'll look at clarifying it. ;)

<comment><USER7> You're absolutely correct. I read "yields" colloquially, not in terms of "yield." Written as designed. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There is a LRU cache in the standard library starting in 3.2: [https://docs.python.org/3/library/functools.html#functools.l...](https://docs.python.org/3/library/functools.html#functools.lru_cache)

Doesn't have quite the same options, but arguably nicer to use because it's a decorator.

<comment><AUTHOR> boltons has an all-purpose cache decorator, which gives you an arrangement with a lot more in terms of flexibility and transparency: [https://boltons.readthedocs.org/en/latest/cacheutils.html#au...](https://boltons.readthedocs.org/en/latest/cacheutils.html#automatic- function-caching)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> "The :class:`set` type brings brings the practical expressiveness of set theory to Python. It has a very rich API overall, but lacks a couple of fundamental features. For one, sets are not ordered. On top of this, sets are not indexable"

I suppose that may be because sets are not supposed to be ordered. Nor indexable.

<comment><USER12> In which context? I guess not in math:

[http://mathworld.wolfram.com/TotallyOrderedSet.html](http://mathworld.wolfram.com/TotallyOrderedSet.html)

<comment><USER11> You guessed wrong. From your own link:

>>A total order (or "totally ordered set," or "linearly ordered set") is a set plus a relation on the set<<

Please note that "set" (unqualified) means the general concept of a set. You can extend that general concept, but then what you get is a new thing (in this case a "totally ordered set").

<comment><USER12> And who said that our use in Python doesn't need this extended concept?

<comment><USER11> Did anybody say it doesn't?

I am sure I didn't.

But claiming that Python's implementation of sets "lacks fundamental features" is unfair, wrong, and making the world a dumber place. Some might want to live in that place. I don't.

<comment><USER12> It seems that your confusion stems from the premise that because this Python collection is called a "set" it should have the absolute minimum functionality of the mathematical notion of a set.

Python collections are data structures (containers etc). The standard library is not a symbolic math library, and they are not supposed to model math entities perfectly (e.g. they can me mutable), they are used for their utility, which might or might not need them to be ordered.

<comment><USER11> The only confused person here is plainly yourself. Either that or you are somehow personally offended and desperately looking to excuse that wrongheaded comment, changing tack every time your latest attempt is shot down. Or you're just a troll. I am running out of care to educate you.

Go on and complain about tree types for not handling cycles. Because hey, sometimes you need cycles, don't you? I will be sure not to comment.

Image related.

[http://i0.kym- cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/131/351/eb6...](http://i0.kym- cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/131/351/eb6.jpg)

<comment><USER12> Besides being rude and offensive (plus tacky, with your meme picture), you still don't seem to comprehend that:

1) the Python standard library is not SymPy or some math modelling library, and its collections are not supposed to map 1 to 1 with the corresponding mathematical entities -- just have those properties that are useful. In fact, the standard python set type is mutable to begin with.

2) even if they were, there are versions of sets in maths were ordering is indeed desired.

So this makes your snarky comments needlessly smug and misguiged in 2 different ways. But given the rudeness, I don't think this warrants any more discussion. Have a nice life.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I like the spirit, however a lot of these can be done with a simple one liner... Example for chunked iteration:

```

def chunk_iter(some_seq, n):

        return (seq[pos:pos + n] for pos in range(0, len(seq), n))

```

example for multi-dict: (unless I'm missing something)

```

from collections import defaultdict

d = defaultdict(list)

d['a'].append('b')

d['a'].append('c')

dict(d)

{'a': ['b', 'c']}

```

<comment><USER14> While your version are usable. They differ in the requirements fulfilled.

e.g.

chunk_iter - _iterables_ not just sequences

multi-dict - <USER2>

Plus nice error messages.

The goal is to be standard library quality.

<comment><AUTHOR> That's right! Boltons are meant to replace those one liners, unless you really really think downstream customers are going to be impressed with code golf birdies. ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Python really need something like Go's official libraries. I mean those with a prefix "golang.org/x/". Those libraries update more often than stdlibs but still provide a concrete common ground for developers. It is like "evergreen" stdlibs.

<comment><USER16> This is being talked about now with [PEP 411 - Provisional packages in the Python standard library][1].

[1]: [https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0411/](https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0411/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> So glad someone did something like this and made it presentable enough for widespread usage.

In contrast, my own "utils" libraries[1] are often too specific, or not well documented. However, there's already some overlap (eg. I had my own version of funutils.mro_items()), and later today I'll take a look through and see what of mine might be a candidate for inclusion.

[1] [https://github.com/ekimekim/pylibs/tree/master/libs](https://github.com/ekimekim/pylibs/tree/master/libs)

<comment><AUTHOR> Please do! Quality is not uniform throughout the library, and while mro_items covered my use cases, I fully anticipate others might have more comprehensive approaches.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Is that their real name?

Are they related to that singer guy?

</comment><comment><USER19> So glad to see this - there are things here I thought I was weird for having to make and want myself - liked chunked iterations. I assumed there as something wrong with me ... Glad to see it's not just me

Nice one

</comment><comment><USER20> These are great!

You know, this makes me thing about how there are so many things that I wish Python would come with: requests, lxml, gevents and a good amount of stuff from the package.

I wish there was Python 2.8.

<comment><USER21> I wish the regular threading interface was as nice as gevents. Gevents is stunningly simple to use for a lot of simple things where I find trying to use the threading library (I.e. when you want to deal with paramiko) is much harder.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Where are the tests?

<comment><AUTHOR> They're around. Doctests cover most of the library, many modules have main()s that take care of some more complex unit tests, then the applications that use the utilities cover a lot of regression cases. Tests are kept as close to the code as possible to keep each module independent and self-explanatory, as explained here: [https://boltons.readthedocs.org/en/latest/architecture.html](https://boltons.readthedocs.org/en/latest/architecture.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> wow, this is awesome.

boltons.tableutils has a lot of TODOs - if you like the concept, the littletable package [1] takes the concept of a python query language pretty far. I put it in production and extended it even further [2]. We'd both welcome help / pull requests.

[1] [https://www.google.com/search?q=python+littletable](https://www.google.com/search?q=python+littletable)

[2] [https://github.com/asah/littletable](https://github.com/asah/littletable)</comment>


Distributed and collaborative music and video creation - <AUTHOR> http://wholeworldband.com/

<comment><USER2> any BPM sync possibility to expand the stuff available to remix/collaborate?</comment>


I've created a crypto lending startup - <AUTHOR> https://smartcredit.io/ <comment><AUTHOR> SmartCredit.io is a crypto lending platform with low collateral requirements for the borrower and with transferable loans for the lender. SmartCredit.io offers as well Credit As A Service API for the integration with other wallets, marketplaces, and payment providers.</comment>


Technorati: maybe you could've tested a little more - <AUTHOR> http://www.flickr.com/photos/41758452@N00/2770914035/sizes/o/ all i did was click on Technology tab about 10 minutes ago... <comment><USER2> Or at least turn public errors off!</comment>


Exporting stackdriver logs to splunk - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@shoewielder/google-cloud-log-export-to-splunk-3f05a436abca <comment><AUTHOR> Our summer intern Richard Bachmann just wrote a blogpost about his project where he connected one of our kubernetes cluster in the google cloud platform to a security monitoring tool we have running in Splunk (we = Telenor Digital).</comment>